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Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

robert.ocallahan.org

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Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#201

Post by shangxiao »

lucb1e wrote: post #194
myrryr wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are we to do? We build data visualization software, but firefox is REALLY slow at rendering SVG (so no d3 for us). We have a choice of asking our customers to run ie11 or chrome, since both run quickly. We would recommend firefox, since we really like the Mozilla foundation, but the performance of it is so bad we have to steer people away from it. It is a sad state of affairs.

If you make software (which people want to use, of course) and notice a mainstream open source browser (in this case Firefox) being slow at something in particular, wouldn't it be advantageous to you and everyone else if some of you could briefly look under the hood to see what the problem is? Maybe not fix the bug, but at least let Mozilla know that there is a pain point somewhere (perhaps with specific source files…

Have you ever "looked under the hood" ? Browsers aren't your average weekend open source project, they're behemoths :)

I once checked out chromium in order to test out whether file writing would be easy to do. The size of the project alone meant it took me forever to find out where to patch it.

(Edit: This was something like 5 years ago before I started to grow a distaste for Chrome)

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#202

Post by stephenr »

DCKing wrote: post #191
stephenr wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Android is open source in the same way that I can eat a cockroach. In theory, yes. In practice, you can forget about.

It doesn't matter whether you can download the source for the devices you buy in the store. Not in the context of this discussion about vendor lock-in. You're using a red herring. The point is: if you don't like devices on sale with Chrome, Chrome OS or Android, you can download the source code and make it run on your own devices. Google really doesn't mind at all if you do that. The point is: Google doesn't profit f…

I was referring more to the fact that what Google says ("embrace the open web", "open source wins", etc) don't really mean shit.

Chrome isn't open source, chromium is. What are the extra bits in chrome?

My issue is not that google does what it does, my issue is the religious cult like status so many tech related people give google, in spite of their numerous and repeated attempts to control so many facts of the digital landscape

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#203

Post by lucb1e »

andor wrote: post #118
higherpurpose wrote: post #94

I expect 2 things from Firefox before I consider seriously switching: 1) Bring security sandboxing already. 2) Fix the terrible rendering on Android. Seriously, Firefox has literally the worst rendering out of all mobile browsers. And by worst, I mean slowest . I don't know whether it's some kind of on purpose delayed rendering, or if it's just that slow, but they need to change that. It's especially more obvious on…

Fix the terrible rendering on Android. Seriously, Firefox has literally the worst rendering out of all mobile browsers. And by worst, I mean slowest. Firefox feels fast on the Nexus 5. I use it over Chrome, because I want to disable third-party cookies. Chrome on Android doesn't give me that option...

> Firefox feels fast on the Nexus 5.

Same here on a Galaxy Note II. Pretty high-end phone though, that might have something to do with it. Still, been using Firefox ever since I got the phone (my first Android after years of Symbian) and I'm very happy with it. It even has about:config included!

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#204

Post by findjashua »

jfuhrman wrote: post #149
jfuhrman wrote: post #136

For those saying Google is a benevolent company, here are a few signs that the bean counters are taking over: Tracking Google Apps for Education and even paid Google Apps for Business emails to build ad profiles, making misleading statement to the public that they're not doing so, and then when it finally came to statements to federal court, lacking the dare to continue lying and finally confessing the truth and then…

Edit: I can't edit my post, perhaps due to the downvotes(why downvote without replying?), so here's a couple more. Tying Android App store to having Google search engine as default on Android, ensuring that alternative search engines cannot be shipped as default. http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2014/02/12/documents-shed-light-... Stopping Acer from shipping Aliyun OS by threatening to pull the Play Store and Android beta…

You stated facts, with sources. I can't see why someone would downvote, and that too without stating the reason. I upvoted to counter at least one downvoter.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#205

Post by chimeracoder »

mythz wrote: post #39

If the premise here is that Google is the evil empire, why is Google still on the Home Page when running Firefox?? Apparently large sums of money can have an effect on ethics. Obviously the underlying goal here is a plea for more FF marketshare, but it's a tad hypocritical if the message is to not use services from a company you're promoting yourself. That's do as I say, not as I do type stuff.

It's not hypocritical. Google pays Mozilla to be the default search engine, and this is the main source of Mozilla's money.

If you don't want them to be so dependent on Google, then donate - every dollar you donate to Mozilla brings them closer to being independent from Google: https://sendto.mozilla.org/page/contribute/Give-Now

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#206

Post by bachmeier »

specialp wrote: post #54

This is actually very true. Having Chrome/V8 out there has definitely improved the state of browsers as far as performance; especially in regards to JavaScript. But now we face a situation where Google is getting such a market share with Chrome and their other web properties where lock in is a very real possibility, and the only way to keep an open, standardized web is to make sure there are still other browsers with…

> we face a situation where Google is getting such a market share with Chrome and their other web properties where lock in is a very real possibility

I agree that Chrome has a high market share among web developers. The statistics I've looked at for all users have never put Chrome above 50%.[1][2] I've even been seeing web developers saying "nobody uses Firefox" and "everyone uses Chrome now".

[1] http://gs.statcounter.com/ [2] http://www.netmarketshare.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qpri...

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#207

Post by lucb1e »

rwmj wrote: post #13

I do use Firefox, through inertia, but honestly it's not a good browser. It consumes 50%+ CPU constantly. It uses huge amounts of RAM. It crashes from time to time. Every few months I end up losing all my open tabs permanently. There's no isolation (process per tab). And they keep making gratuitous changes to the UI that don't improve the real UI problems but do require searching through about:config to revert them.…

I know it's horribly outdated and probably not for you, but if you have a really, really low-end system, K-Meleon is the best option that I could find, at least for Windows. It's not great but works fairly reasonable for how lightweight it is. This is what enabled me to surf the web on a Pentium 2 machine in 2010 where any other browser had issues even getting started.

I do see what you mean with a minimal browser though. It is what Chrome was initially: the basics that you needed and no clutter. I would like to see such a project based on Firefox, especially given how customizable Firefox already is it might be a pretty awesome project.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#208

Post by shangxiao »

GlennS wrote: post #153
myrryr wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are we to do? We build data visualization software, but firefox is REALLY slow at rendering SVG (so no d3 for us). We have a choice of asking our customers to run ie11 or chrome, since both run quickly. We would recommend firefox, since we really like the Mozilla foundation, but the performance of it is so bad we have to steer people away from it. It is a sad state of affairs.

I'm a little surprised by this. I can believe that Firefox is slower (I haven't done the comparison myself), but even so it's still capable of rendering hundreds of thousands of points or thousands of complicated geometric shapes. I would have thought it you had more data than that then the points will all be rammed together and hard to distinguish, so it would be better to switch to density plots.

I've also noticed it slower on an SVG based app. Not terribly slower, just enough to make it look slightly glitchy compared with the smoothness of Chrome with interactive actions like drag n dropping components around.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#209

Post by 1ris »

pera wrote: post #177
1ris wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have to agree: For me firefox performance is much better. I currently have 413 tabs open, use a 3 year old lenovo laptop, everything works flawless and is responsive, unlike chrome.

413 tabs?? why?

Why not? That's the way I use the web. If i need it at some point the next week I don't close it.

Re: Choose Firefox Now, Or Later You Won't Get A Choice

#210

Post by dammitcoetzee »

Everyone's mentioning this separate process business and subtle engine differences web developers compensate for and I never experience. However,I really don't care about all that. Chrome is just nicer to use: one search/url bar, few buttons but all purposeful, can drag and split windows easily. Best browser. Only recently annoying thing is it asking me to sign up for some sort of sync constantly. I have no idea why I'd ever want to do that. When I load up Firefox I'm just overwhelmed by how much stuff there is. If someone made a chrome-like Firefox I'd use it no problem.
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